Jim Jontz

Jontz died on April 14, 2007 in Portland, following a lengthy battle with colon cancer.

Jontz attempted to return to Washington in 1994 by challenging three-term Senator Dick Lugar He lost to Lugar by more than 600,000 votes, and even lost his old congressional district.

Following his 1994 defeat, Jontz subsequently moved to Portland, Oregon, where he began working as Executive Director for the Western Ancient Forest Campaign. In 1999, Jontz helped organize the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment (ASJE). While with WAFC, Jontz built an extremely effective grassroots organizing campaign, which pushed aggressively to protect forests, remove federal subsidies that financed clearcutting, and preserve millions of acres of previously unprotected roadless areas in National Forests. During his tenure with WAFC, he travelled extensively around the country forming relationships with state and local forest protection groups. As a result, Jontz was revered by forest activists throughout North America. In the spirit of Martin Luther King, Jr., Jontz participated in acts of civil disobedience — including blocking a logging road in the Siskiyou National Forest in Oregon — to raise awareness about the plight of ancient forests. Those courageous acts were hailed by forest advocates as further proof that Jontz was one of the greatest leaders of the modern environmental movement. In 1998, Jontz was elected president of Americans for Democratic Action (ADA). He was most recently the ADA president emeritus and served as a project coordinator for ADA's Working Families Win project.

Jontz was narrowly defeated in 1992 by Steve Buyer, an Army officer, Gulf War veteran, and lawyer making his first bid for office.

Jontz was elected to Congress in 1986 after the retirement of 16-year incumbent Republican Bud Hillis. However, the Republican nominee, State Senator James Butcher, was wounded from a fractious Republican primary, allowing Jontz to win narrowly. He was handily reelected in 1988, but faced much stiffer competition in 1990.

His political career began in 1974, sparked by his opposition to a dam-building project in Central Indiana. Running for a seat in the Indiana House of Representatives against the dam's sponsor, House Majority Leader John Guy. He was elected at age 22 by a margin of only 2 votes. He was reelected five more times in a heavily Republican district, even after the Republican-controlled legislature made it even more Republican on paper after the 1980 census. He was elected to the Indiana Senate in 1984, where he served for only two years before being elected to the U.S. House.

James Prather Jontz (December 18, 1951 – April 14, 2007) was an American politician who represented the Indiana's 5th congressional district, comprising rural north central Indiana, centering on Kokomo and Logansport. A Democrat, he served in the United States House of Representatives from 1987 to 1993. He was previously a member of the Indiana General Assembly.

He was born in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1951. He graduated at the age of 17 from North Central High School in Washington Township in Indianapolis.